A Breakdown of Live Video Services

2016 was the year of live video services popping up on the scene. Live video isn’t for everyone, but it can be useful in certain situations. Here’s a breakdown of the top three social media platforms that offer it.

Instagram

Instagram’s live video service was launched in November 2016. As Instagram is a mobile-only platform, video live-streaming is only available on mobile. There is a 1-hour time limit to the stream, and videos do disappear after the broadcasts, unlike some other platforms.

Instagram’s live video can be quite useful to your brand and your marketing, but it’s dependent on what kind of business you have. One of the cons is that the marketing on Instagram is completely different than marketing on other social media platforms, such as Twitter or Facebook.

Twitter

Twitter followed after Instagram with the release of its live video feature in December 2016. Again, Twitter chose to make the streaming for mobile-only. There is no time limit on live Twitter videos though, and you can choose to save the broadcast.

In 2015 Twitter bought the livestreaming app Periscope, so technically you could say that Twitter has had this capability for a long time. Until December the way that the live-streaming worked was that you could connect Periscope and Twitter, and share your live-streams through Twitter. It still required having accounts for both services though, and there was the problem. Live videos that are streamed on Twitter will also be streamed on Periscope.

This is the newest streaming option available and there are still some kinks to work out, even though it seems to be a promising marketing platform.

Facebook

Facebook wins the race of release dates, releasing its video streaming service in April 2016. Facebook’s version is mobile-only but its currently working on a desktop version. There is a 4-hour time limit to Facebook live videos.

The Facebook live stream video was wide released in April 2016, with earlier versions available in 2015, so users are far more familiar with this platform’s version. You can even target certain groups of people with your live videos. Facebook also saves broadcasts which means that users can share them, for extra viewers. This is a simple fact that may be winning the marketing battle. The fact that users can save and share their past live videos mean that there’s more value to them, as users can still see them after the event has passed.